


I knew myself (I couldn't fly).

by suganii (feints)



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Deep Existential Thoughts at 2am, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-22 02:22:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30031578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/feints/pseuds/suganii
Summary: Udai Tenma, and angsting over your characters at unreasonable hours of the morning.You see, Ojiro the libero is almost uproariously good. He’s tall, loves his position, lovesvolleyballenough to daydream maybe playing for the pros one day, and so Tenma brings him to life with a generous brush of yellow, the color of blessedness, of wealth. Perhaps he’d been a tad ostentatious about ite, from the shade of that truly awful mess of a banana mop on top of his head to the neon jersey he wears to every game, but still.Ojiro does not carry his prison around himself wherever he goes. He does not set himself up to rust, or fade to cinders. He is unfiltered sun and buzzing, inevitable summers, and Tenma likes to think of him as the friend Tenma didn’t have back then that he wished he’d had.One day, Ojiro will pull Tenma’s blazing bright protagonist aside and tell him it will be okay. He can learn to hate volleyball, and then come to love it again.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6
Collections: Little Giant Week 2021





	I knew myself (I couldn't fly).

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Nicini](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nicini/gifts).



> for nicini. it's still tenma week!! in some parts of the world!! so here's some of tenma's musings re: his main characters in meteo attack + a conversation with inunaki shion, because that's just how it be sometimes, amirite?
> 
> for the prompts:#10, heart, manga/artist.
> 
> note: before you get into this fic, i heartily recommend reading mine and nicini's fic on [inunaki and tenma's friendship](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25559011). this fic is assumed to be mostly within the same timeline, though it can also be read as a standalone. still, it'd be cool if you checked out linked fic too:D

Tenma’s manga protagonist has hair the shade of roaring flames and tortilla chips, both of which are things he’s incidentally fascinated by, runs more than he walks, and speaks with a pronounced _kansai ben_ that he’s sometimes teased for, whether in the whisper of classroom hallways or the bubble of lunch cafeterias. He also holds himself like a mountain, or maybe a volcano, bursting and spitting and _huge_ —all to protect the insecurities of the little boy he carries inside, the one with all the worry and pain and fear. It’s a little boy he carries inside every day, nesting him deep within the heart of a body of iron, forged strong and proud until he can stand on his own two feet too.

Akaashi calls him a strong personality, and he’s not wrong.

Tenma sees himself in him, from the number of hours he punishes himself with steadily burning himself up, burning out, to the bluster and obsessive passion that wars with the self he portrays for the rest of the world to see. Tenma sees him, and remembers punching at lockers, banging his head into walls. He sees a boy blurred slightly around the edges, eraser marks approaching the lines of him, and feels the aftertaste still sitting like gall on his tongue.

Once, his world had begun, ended, and begun again, the day he realised he would rather sketch out a volleyball game he’d envisioned in his head than actually take a ball to hand and play. It had scared him, then. Angered him, then. He had taken those particular sketches and buried them under his bed with all his skeletons, vowing to end his high school on a high.

Tenma is no longer that mourning boy, lost. So wouldn’t it make sense, really, that Tenma doesn’t actually much like his protagonist after all?

You see, Ojiro the libero, on the other hand, is almost uproariously good. He’s tall, loves his position, loves _volleyball_ enough to daydream maybe playing for the pros one day, and so Tenma brings him to life with a generous brush of yellow, the color of blessedness, of wealth. Perhaps he’d been a tad ostentatious about it—and Akaashi would agree—from the shade of that truly awful mess of a banana mop on top of his head to the neon jersey he wears to every game, but still.

Ojiro does not carry his prison around himself wherever he goes. He does not set himself up to rust, or fade to cinders. He is unfiltered sun and buzzing, inevitable summers, and Tenma likes to think of him as the friend Tenma didn’t have back then that he wished he’d had.

One day, Ojiro will pull Tenma’s blazing bright protagonist aside and tell him it will be okay. He can learn to hate volleyball, and then come to love it again.

It’s two in the morning. Tenma closes his eyes, traces the bold outline of Ojiro’s character design in his mind’s eye, and wonders if he might have a problem after all. He knows if he contacts his editor at this hour over such an inane question, Akaashi would never forgive him. _Tenma_ wouldn’t forgive himself. And so:

_Tenma:_ do u rly hate the libero i wrote?

 _Inunaki:_ ur lucky im awake

 _Inunaki_ : lol why r u asking me dis even

 _Inunaki:_ u noe my feelings on the Hair. the Uniform.

 _Tenma_ : but do you hate him???

 _Inunaki:_ well. is all that yellow rly necessary

 _Tenma:_ yellow is the representation of prosperity!!

 _Inunaki_ : so give him a yellow cap

 _Tenma:_ don’t tempt me…

 _Inunaki:_ pls god i take it back

 _Tenma:_ I just feel like it’s weird… to just… like volleyball like that

 _Inunaki_ : ???

 _Inunaki:_ u r aware what i do for a living right

 _Tenma:_ but do you actly love it tho. or is it like, just a job?

 _Inunaki:_ …

 _Inunaki:_ hinata was right. u have rly weird hang ups sometimes.

 _Tenma:_ excuse me?

 _Inunaki_ : srsly bro, don’t make me book a ticket on the shinkansen just to kick ur ass

 _Tenma_ : it was just a question???

 _Inunaki_ : dear god. ok yes i like ojiro. he is, as the kids say, neat

 _Tenma:_ you mean that?

 _Inunaki:_ yes

 _Tenma:_ ok

 _Tenma:_ thx

 _Inunaki:_ lol

 _Inunaki:_ ur welc

 _Inunaki:_ now gimme a kiss

[ **Inunaki Shion has been blocked.** ]

Tenma’s manga protagonist is a little full of himself, with a furnace for a chest and iron in his veins that threatens to rust, and Tenma might not be too fond of him. But he’s determined to do him right.

His arch-rival, Ojiro the libero on the other hand, is bright like the sunflowers Tenma occasionally receives from his editor; not a prodigy, but not without his talents either. So, Tenma decides to give him the number 10 jersey that Tenma himself had once received at the apex of his volleyball career. And a hideous yellow cap. It feels right too.

Tenma forces himself back to sleep. Tomorrow, he has plans to interview the coach from Aoba Johsai on efficient volleyball practices. He hopes to make a good impression there at least.

**Author's Note:**

> writing this while listening to _tobe fly_ is so strangely heartachey. do you ever just. think about haikyuu?
> 
> also let's just pretend that tenma has a slightly healthier manga schedule here and he can afford to think deep thinky thoughts at 2am instead of just passing out. ah, the manga industry grind.


End file.
